Psalm 70:1: “Make haste, O God, to deliver me! / Make haste to help me, O LORD!”

March 16th, 2024 by Pastor Ed in devotional

David opened this psalm with a frantic plea: “Lord, don’t take long!” And he ended it with a similar appeal: “Do not delay.” When we are in distress, it is often because we feel the pressure of time. I imagine there is a round of chuckles every time a prayer of mine, like this one, reaches heaven. Funny? Yes, because God never needs to hurry. He already has a preplanned timetable and the power to bring everything into His plan at the exact time He wishes. He is never caught off guard and never panics. Our God can move as easily into tomorrow, as He can back at this instant. It is a difficult thing for us to remember since we are caught in and subject to time.

There are 3 huge gates that lead into the cathedral of Milan that illustrate this truth. Over one gate is an inscription in marble that states: “The Things That Please Us Are Temporary.” Over the second gate there is a cross with the inscription: “The Things That Disturb Us Are Temporary.” However, over the central gate, there is a big inscription that reads: “Eternal Things Are The Important Ones.” What constitutes a crisis on earth, may not be a crisis from the eternal perspective. We are tempted to think that God is not helping us in time, that He hasn’t taken into account all the variables, that He doesn’t understand the desperateness of our situation. But this is simply untrue. God is always on time, every time.

“LORD, help us to slow down and wait on You to act on our behalf this day in Jesus’ name.”